Starting to seriously consider a custom loop

[Sarra]

Info first:

 

Case is a Fractal Meshify C Mini

CPU will be a 5950X

GPU will be a 6800XT

 

There's not much else in the case, actually lol

 

So, I'm limited a 280mm rad up front and a 360 up top, with a 120mm in the rear.

 

I was thinking about EK block for the CPU and GPU, then a pair of 280mm rads, one front, one top. Fans will be 140mm Noctua fans, I already have two.

 

I'm going to assume that two 280mm rads will be sufficient to keep both the GPU and CPU cool for long duration rendering projects, while also not getting overly loud? If I was going with a 5900X, I would probably just get an AIO for the GPU. The case and airflow just doesn't seem to have quite enough airflow to aircool a card that makes this much heat, my Vega 64 undervolted struggles to stay cool enough. @__@ Any advice would be great.

[Arrogath]

Just something to keep in mind if you live in North America, Tariffs on EK water cooling parts can be quite high. For example, just my Magnitude AM4 block and some bottles of cooling additive (biocide/anti corrosion) was over 70 CAD. In terms of cooling potential I think 2x280mm should be more than adequate, although are both slim 280? I'm personally running two 360 mm, one slim and one thick, and that's fairly heavy for a 3950x and a water cooled GPU but keeps the fan levels lower during extended loads.

[Sarra]

8 minutes ago, Arrogath said:

Just something to keep in mind if you live in North America, Tariffs on EK water cooling parts can be quite high. For example, just my Magnitude AM4 block and some bottles of cooling additive (biocide/anti corrosion) was over 70 CAD. In terms of cooling potential I think 2x280mm should be more than adequate, although are both slim 280? I'm personally running two 360 mm, one slim and one thick, and that's fairly heavy for a 3950x and a water cooled GPU but keeps the fan levels lower during extended loads.

I should be able to do either one slim and one regular thickness, or two regular thickness. just comes down to which 6800XT I end up with.

 

The top rad, which could be a 360, wouldn't have anything close to it, so it should be fine either way.

[Mick Naughty]

The ek 280 rads are amazing. Have to be my favorite ive ever got. Need more to replace my Corsair/Bitspower rads. 
 

It should be enough. I’d just be concerned about balancing airflow to limit dust. 

[Sarra]

13 minutes ago, Mick Naughty said:

The ek 280 rads are amazing. Have to be my favorite ive ever got. Need more to replace my Corsair/Bitspower rads. 
 

It should be enough. I’d just be concerned about balancing airflow to limit dust. 

I got two 140mm intakes and a single 120mm exhaust right now. I could always run higher RPM on the intake than the exhaust...

[bowrilla]

15 hours ago, Sarra said:

Info first:

 

Case is a Fractal Meshify C Mini

CPU will be a 5950X

GPU will be a 6800XT

 

There's not much else in the case, actually lol

 

So, I'm limited a 280mm rad up front and a 360 up top, with a 120mm in the rear.

 

I was thinking about EK block for the CPU and GPU, then a pair of 280mm rads, one front, one top. Fans will be 140mm Noctua fans, I already have two.

 

I'm going to assume that two 280mm rads will be sufficient to keep both the GPU and CPU cool for long duration rendering projects, while also not getting overly loud? If I was going with a 5900X, I would probably just get an AIO for the GPU. The case and airflow just doesn't seem to have quite enough airflow to aircool a card that makes this much heat, my Vega 64 undervolted struggles to stay cool enough. @__@ Any advice would be great.

The Meshify C mini officially only supports 240mm radiators at the top and 280mm in the front (width restriction 144mm).

 

That case has good airflow by the way. 2x280mm is plenty and can basically cool every mainstream component you can throw at it. 240+280 is also enough.

 

HWLabs radiators are better by the way but you will need to check within the case if those 144mm are a hard restriction or if you can fit the 146.4mm wide HWLabs GTS series rads at the front.

 

You will also need to check mainboard clearance at top.

[For Science!]

This dropping by to say that you won't get a 280 mm up top. This is what a 240 looks like in the top of a Meshify C, you can see they barely clear the memory and as I have a monoblock it cleared that okay, but if you had heatsinks....

 

[Sarra]

Gotcha on the clearance. I hadn't noticed that before...

 

So 240 up top and 280 in the front is the plan. Well, I could external mount the rad... I don't think I want to. My old PC has passthroughs for watercooling for external mounting. I never bothered with it, obviously...

[For Science!]

41 minutes ago, Sarra said:

Gotcha on the clearance. I hadn't noticed that before...

 

So 240 up top and 280 in the front is the plan. Well, I could external mount the rad... I don't think I want to. My old PC has passthroughs for watercooling for external mounting. I never bothered with it, obviously...

This is also up to you, but for my meshify C build, I found that double exhaust configuration (i.e. both radiators exhaust, front and top) improved my temperatures. I think the case is too compact to tolerate the heated air being pushed past through the components. So I have a negative pressure system with one rear intake (filtered), and adjusted the fan speed of the radiator fans so that they spin really slowly until needed to maintain some degree of neutrality during normal operation.